Windows 7 Search not working as it should? Ever since Windows introduced its indexed search, obtaining reliable search results has been an odyssey. The big problem with Windows indexed search results is that not everything gets indexed. Windows only indexes folders it thinks are important, and when we have a computer deciding what we need, we start getting into many problems.

Lets backtrack to the windows 2000 days. All you had to do to find what you needed, was to open the search utility and look for the filename; it would take some time but results were very reliable. Somehow, Microsoft decided users needed help with this simple and reliable interface and with the release of Windows XP, it introduced a search wizard along with some annoying cartoon characters to “help you” search. Fortunately, you could still go back to the old interface with just a few configuration changes. With the release of Windows Vista and 7, Microsoft decided to completely eliminate the simple interface and introduce an “indexed” search which made it a lot harder to obtain reliable search results; all in the name of speed.

Fortunately, other companies have decided to fix what Microsoft has spent years destroying. In this article I will be reviewing a tool which completely takes you back to the old reliable and simple search interface. A tool named FileSearchEX

Reliability Test

Here at GeekyProjects, we always test software before recommending it to our readers. To compare both search utilities, we created an empty text file and copied it to several directories which windows does not index.

We named out test file “test.gp” and placed it into the following directories:

c:\
c:\Program Files
c:\Users\Admin\AppData

Search Results With Windows 7 Search

Search Results With FileSearchEX

The results speak for themselves.

Installation

To install FilesSearchEX all that needs to be done is uncompress the contents to a directory somewhere on the computer, then click on “FileSearchEX.exe” and start searching. The program does not even need to be installed on the computer; so it does not make any changes to Windows; you can use it or go back to your regular Windows 7 search anytime you wish.

The program does have a registry updater file which is supposed to be the only part of a supposed installation. It is not clear however, whether it is needed or not for the program to function properly. We ran the program and it runs fine without it; so it is up to you if you want to do this update.

Final Thoughts

FileSearchEX is a no-nonsense alternative to Windows 7’s flawed search utility. It is considerably fast and offers accurate and reliable search results. It saves you from frustration when Windows search is not working. FileseachEX however, is not perfect. One evident flaw is its inability to search for text within a file; we are hopeful the program’s creators introduce this feature in the future. If you wish to search for text within a file you can always go back to the Windows 7 search, but again, good luck getting reliable results.

2 comments:

pcunite, 11. August 2011, 11:52

Mehrdad,
What problem are you having? The developers have been very helpful in the comment section on their blog. In fact a BETA is out today that adds new functionality. Again, what problem are you having?

Mehrdad, 5. August 2011, 10:09

The file content search in FileSearchEx does not work properly either.

(My system: Win 7 64bit)

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